The Meaning of Reality
by swfdgirl37
Summary: Post "Lauren". Spoilers abound. Reid can't cope with this, not after already dealing with so much. He just couldn't.


The Meaning of Reality

Summary: Post 'Lauren'. Spoilers abound. Reid can't cope with this, not after already dealing with so much. He just couldn't.

* * *

"She never made it off the table."

Those words rang in his ears, and then he heard nothing at all. Sound, feeling, reality, it all ceased to mean anything.

He just sat on a hard plastic chair, tears falling all around him, grief filling the air, and he didn't notice any of it. He couldn't, not if he had wanted to.

He didn't want to.

An eternity seemed to begin and end before he felt anything again, before a flicker of life came to his eyes. In truth, it had only been seconds.

He stood automatically, his legs somehow propelling him upward. He took one step, then another, and another. Before long he was walking.

Not walking, he was _leaving._

"Spence." That one word broke through the fog in his mind, and he formed one word, then another, and another. He spoke a single sentence, somehow.

"I never got to say goodbye."

A crack threatened to break his wall.

"Oh, Spence." She embraced him into a warm hug.

His wall came crumbling down.

Tears leaked from his eyes, his face contorted with grief.

But his heart, it was ripped, torn to shreds by yet another person who had left him.

Why did everyone leave him?

And then even JJ let go, and walked away from their embrace.

He felt empty again.

So, without looking back, he walked out of the hospital, and into the open air of the night.

He walked to his apartment, not caring about the distance, not caring about how late into the night it was.

He just walked.

His apartment was lonely as ever, his books his only companions. He ignored them as he made his way to his bedroom.

Step, breathe in, step, breathe out, step.

His footsteps echoed in the silent room, his breaths resounded in his ears, and as he fell onto his bed, the sound of protesting springs reminded of the screams of those he couldn't save.

He wondered if Prentiss had screamed when she was impaled.

_No,_ he thought, _Prentiss is-_

"Dead," he finished aloud, whispering.

_Prentiss _was_ strong, _he corrected his unfinished thought.

And then his tears began anew.

They lasted for hours, until finally, thankfully, he sank into a dreamless, painless slumber.

* * *

He awoke the next morning with the most painful headache he had ever had.

The morning light coming through his windows did nothing to help.

Blindly, with one hand over his face and the other outstretched, he groped for the curtains. Finding them, he clumsily pulled them shut.

His brain was still on fire.

He experimentally opened his eyes, gasping with pain as the dim light of his bedroom was enough to split open his forehead.

Slamming his eyelids shut once more, he stumbled back to his bed, collapsing onto it.

He laid there for hours, groaning loudly when waves of searing pain began to ravage his mind.

He heard a knock on his door at 3:37 PM. And then he heard a voice.

"Reid," Derek Morgan shouted, "It's me, open up."

He moaned, and found a reserve of strength which was just enough to get him off of the mattress.

Getting to the door, however, was another story.

"Reid, c'mon man, I know you're in there!" Morgan shouted, "Don't make me kick the door in!"

"Coming!" he mumbled, wincing at the sound. Step, breathe in, step, breathe out, stop, breathe in, breathe out, step, breathe in…

He made it to the door and opened it slowly.

"Reid, man, we've all been worrying about you…" Morgan trailed off when he saw the state that Reid was in, "Oh my God, Reid, what happened to you?"

He thought about denying that anything was wrong, he thought about telling Morgan that he was fine, he thought about a lot of things.

But in a moment of weakness, of pain, of _emptiness_, he caved.

"I've been having these really intense headaches lately," he began, wincing as another one hit, "and usually I can hide it, but this one was so much worse than the others."

"Have you seen a doctor?" Morgan asked, just like another agent had, not so long ago…

His eyes were suddenly filled with blinding light; his head was filled with nothing but raw, powerful, searing pain.

He collapsed.

A shout of "Reid!" was the last thing he heard before he blacked out.

* * *

He woke up hours later on his bed.

Morgan was nowhere in sight.

But his headache had finally ended.

"Morgan?" he shouted, rising from the pile of blankets. He padded silently throughout his apartment, searching for his colleague.

Finally, he ended his search. He glanced at a clock to find that he needed to be at work in an hour and a half.

He dressed while in a haze, he made coffee, he went through his usual routines, but he still felt very out of place.

He made his way to work, and, upon spotting Morgan, he ventured over to him.

"Morgan," he said quietly.

"Oh, hey man," Morgan replied wearily.

"Why did you leave last night?" Reid asked.

"What do you mean?" Morgan replied, confusedly.

"When you came over, and I…and I told you about my…well you know," Reid stated, agitated at having to repeat the previous night's confession.

"Reid," Morgan said, worriedly, "I never went to your apartment last night."

When Reid's only reply was a confused look, Morgan continued, "Are you feeling alright?"

Snapping back to reality, Reid dismissed his worries with a wave of his hand, "Of course," he lied, "I'm just tired, you know?"

"Yeah," Morgan said, still unsure of how to proceed, "Well, I've…got to get back to paperwork, so talk to you later?"

"Yeah," Reid replied, already leaving the bullpen, "talk to you later."

* * *

Author's Note: My very first Criminal Minds fanfic. I feel as though I ended this poorly. No, I know I ended this poorly. But I present it to thee anyway. I may somehow continue this fic upon request, but honestly I'm not sure where I would go with it. It popped into my head, I was feeling angsty, and so I wrote this. Also, there was no beta other than a quick read through by me, and spell check done by Microsoft Word.

Please review; it will bring me lovely rainbows of happiness.

Disclaimer: I don't own anything….except the laptop which I wrote this with, and the TV which I view Criminal Minds with.


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